The Shining Sea (18 page)

Fortunately, the
Essex
continued to perform better than expected. On February 24 Porter, to his immense delight, found that they had reached longitude 80° west, and as the wind shifted to the southwest, he thought their sufferings were now truly over. He began to develop schemes for annoying the enemy, and at the same time, returning home with immense wealth.

For four days, the weather remained benign—sunny skies and a relatively calm sea. The wind continued to blow hard from the southwest, and on the last day of February the
Essex
had reached latitude 50° south.

Their fortunes soon changed, however. During the morning of February 28, the wind increased to such velocity that a full gale was blowing, and by noon Porter reduced the ship to a storm staysail and close-reefed main topsail. The wind blew from the west during the afternoon “and blew with a fury far exceeding anything we had yet experienced,” he recorded, “bringing with it such a tremendous sea as to threaten us at every moment with destruction and appalled the stoutest heart on board.”

The terrifying gale persisted. “The ship [was making] a great deal of water,” he wrote, “and the sea [increasing] to such a height as to threaten to swallow us each instance; the whole ocean was a continuous foam of breakers. The heaviest squall I have ever before experienced,
has not equaled in violence the most moderate intervals of this hurricane,” he declared.

Birds, kelp, and whales appeared in sufficient quantities to make Porter fearful that they were near the coast of Patagonia. He was forced to keep as heavy a press of sail as he could in order to stay off the rock-encrusted shore, which he felt in his bones was near.

The explosive storm continued through March 1 and 2—horrifying days. The ship's violent jerking caused many to fall and bruise themselves. Porter had three severe falls that hurt him badly. “The oldest seaman in the ship,” he recalled, “had never experienced anything equal to the gale.”

By March 3, the crew was exhausted. Many were ready to give up and submit to fate. Yet the worst was not over. At three o'clock that morning, with only the watch on deck, an enormous sea broke over the ship, greater than any they had experienced before, deluging her. Huge quantities of water smashed in the gun deck ports, flooding the area where the men were sleeping, washing them out of their hammocks. A boat was driven into the wheel, but did not smash it. Another boat was swept off its davits. Spare spars were washed from the chains and the headrails. The crew was in shock; it seemed certain that the ship would founder. One of the prisoners, the boatswain from the
Nocton
, shouted that the ship was sinking. And it seemed for all the world that it was.
David Farragut remembered that “this was the only instance in which I ever saw a real good seaman paralyzed by fear at the dangers of the sea. Several of the sailors were seen on their knees at prayer.”

Miraculously, the men at the wheel stood firm, and others held their stations as well. The crew, it seemed, was not ready to give up. “Most were found ready to do their duty,” Farragut observed. They were called on deck, and they came promptly, led by William Kingsbury, the boatswain's mate who had earlier played King Neptune. Farragut wrote that he would long remember “the cheering sound of [Kingsbury's] stentorian voice, which resembled the roaring of a lion rather than that of a human being, when he told them: ‘Damn [your] eyes, . . . put [your] best foot forward, as there [is a] side of the ship left yet.'”

Porter, though severely bruised, led the fight back. Downes, Kingsbury, and other courageous spirits assisted him, and they managed to get the
Essex
before the wind and save her. As they did, the storm began to weaken,
and in the morning Porter was able to set a reefed foresail. He was enormously grateful to the stout-hearted who had done their duty and behaved so bravely in the most extreme circumstances. He rewarded them by advancing each one grade, filling up the vacancies opened by those sent in prizes and the two men who had been left behind at St. Catharine's. At the same time, Porter rebuked others for their timidity.

Porter was more than a little gratified that the
Essex
had held up so well. After three days of incessant pounding and some truly frightening moments—water pouring in and floating nearly everything—she remained sound, and still a potent man-of-war. Even though she had shipped several heavy seas that would have proved destructive to almost any other ship, she was still in working order. And Porter had been able to avoid throwing any big guns overboard, which was the last extremity he would have resorted to.

Repairs went ahead rapidly. There were remarkably few. The
Essex
had gone through all this torment, and she had lost only the spritsail and the bees of the bowsprit. These were fixed quickly, and in a short time the frigate was shipshape and ready to fight again.

The men were another matter. Totally drained, they had reached their limit. Another onslaught would have sent them to Davy Jones. Mercifully, none came. The weather was actually pleasant on March 5—better, in fact, than any they had experienced since passing the Falkland Islands. At meridian the
Essex
was in latitude 39° 20' south. The day was clear, and the men had an excellent view of the spectacular, snow-covered Andes in the distance. Albatrosses were about the ship, and what a wonderful sight they were. As they moved north, parallel to the Chilean coast, squalls and cold rain tormented them from time to time, but for the most part, they experienced temperate weather and fine breezes, allowing the
Essex
to travel at an excellent rate of speed.

Porter was in an exuberant mood, reflecting on what the
Essex
had accomplished—doubling the infamous Horn in record time. Only thirteen days had elapsed since she passed Le Maire Strait on February 13, and reached the Pacific in the latitude of the Strait of Magellan. Perhaps as remarkable as anything else, through all of these trials, the crew's health remained excellent. Scurvy had not made an appearance—not a single case.

CHAPTER

9

N
AVIGATING
C
HILE'S
P
OLITICAL
W
ATERS

A
S THE WEATHER GREW MORE BENIGN, THE SHOCKS OF
C
APE
Horn faded in the minds of the Essex men, and they began looking forward to what lay ahead in the harbor and waterfront haunts of Valparaiso.
Porter ran north with the Humbolt current, steering first for Mocha Island, 120 miles south of Concepción and twenty miles off the Chilean coast. The island was famous among Nantucket whalers as the habitat of Mocha Dick, an aggressive white sperm whale of gigantic size—the inspiration for Herman Melville's Moby Dick.

On a clear day, Mocha Island was visible from a great distance, and on March 6 it came into view twenty miles away. A lush, oval-shaped paradise six miles long and three and a half wide, it was a joyous sight after what the
Essex
had been through. A small mountain range covered with a dense virgin rainforest ran from north to south, its highest peak rising to nearly a thousand feet. On the north side hills tapered off gradually to the water's edge, almost touching the dangerous rocks that extended a quarter mile into the sea. On the west side a treacherous reef nine miles long made landing hazardous.

The waters surrounding Mocha teemed with whales, seals, penguins, and aquatic birds. British and American whalers and sealers, as well as privateers and smugglers were naturally attracted to the area. It was not uncommon for a whaler to catch as many as eight sperm whales in these waters, yielding hundreds of barrels of oil.

Mocha was uninhabited, but it had not always been. The Spanish built a settlement here in 1544, but harassed by ferocious indigenous people known as Mapuches, the dons abandoned it. Sir Francis Drake landed in 1578, and the Mapuches attacked him as well, slashing his face, leaving an ugly scar as a permanent reminder of his visit. Since 1673, however, the island had been unoccupied. Threats of a Spanish attack forced the Indians to withdraw.

The Mapuches dominated the huge area of Chile south of the Bío Bío River—the country's second largest. The Bío Bío flowed from the Andes to the Gulf of Arauco near Concepción. The Spanish fought the Mapuches from time to time, but never conquered them. In fact, the fiercely independent Mapuches did not become part of Chile until the 1880s.

Porter thought he could scoop up enough prizes around Mocha to secure the provisions he required, allowing him to steer clear of both Concepción and Valparaiso. Leery of the kind of reception the
Essex
would receive, he hoped to avoid both ports. As far as he knew, Chile was still a Spanish colony, and after Napoleon invaded Spain in the spring of 1808, Britain had become her close ally. The
Essex
's sudden appearance in either port would alert the British to her presence in the Pacific.

As the
Essex
approached Mocha, an abundance of wild life came into view, but no enemy vessels, which was a great disappointment. The island itself, however, was anything but disappointing. It looked as if it could provide all the water, wood, meat, vegetables, and fruit the
Essex
needed. Magnificent black and white sandy beaches offered suitable landing places. Porter soon found good anchorage on the eastern side, two miles offshore, where the
Essex
had shelter from westerly and southerly winds, but not those coming from the north or the east. Fortunately, the prevailing winds were from the south and west, so he felt comfortable dropping his hook there.

No sooner was the anchor secure than Porter and some of his officers were rowed ashore by a few lucky sailors. The officers had their spyglasses out, and as they surveyed the island and beaches, they were surprised to
see wild hogs and horses. Their mouths salivated. Getting ashore proved more troublesome than they anticipated, however. A heavy sea was running, beating hard against the beach and the rocks that skirted the shore, creating a turbulent surf. As they looked for a safe place to land, seals and colorful birds surrounded their boats. After a brief, but intense search, Porter ran up on a pristine sandy beach.

With muskets in hand, the officers and seamen stepped from the boats and set out after the animals. By dusk, they had killed and dragged down to the boats ten hogs and some young pigs, but no horses. They were about to shove off when a splendid drove of wild horses came running along the beach in plain view. Porter quickly changed plans and hid with the men behind the boats, waiting in ambush, weapons ready.

One of their members was missing, however. A seaman named James Spafford had wandered into the woods. No one had noticed; all eyes were on the game rushing by. When the horses were within range, Porter and the others fired. One of the animals fell, wounded, while the others ran off. The seamen rushed to the bleeding animal with clubs and were in the process of killing it when a musket shot rang out, and Spafford, the gunner's mate, who was standing apart from the others at the edge of the woods, fell, blood percolating from his chest. Nearsighted Lieutenant Stephen Decatur McKnight, who was aiming at the fleeing horses, had shot Spafford instead. McKnight was aghast when he heard Spafford cry, “Sir, you have shot me! I am a dying man; please carry me on board, that I may die under my country's flag.” McKnight was heartbroken, as were the others. Spafford was one of the most popular and trusted men on the
Essex
. They took him back to the ship, hoping for the best, but when Surgeon Robert Miller examined him, he concluded Spafford had no chance of surviving.

The incident cast a pall over the ship. Although all hands had fresh meat for dinner, it was hard to enjoy while poor Spafford was below fighting for his life. Porter decided not to linger at Mocha. After letting the men have a run on shore, he took in what provisions were easily obtained and prepared to get underway. The island had an abundance of fresh water, wood, and food. The forested hills that ran down to the water's edge made obtaining wood easy, and the picturesque streams that rushed down the west side to the beaches provided sweet water, although at times heavy
surf and the dangerous reef made getting casks off tricky. Meat and fruit were easily obtained as well.

Porter was impatient to leave, however, and he cut short operations. Hands were downcast because of Spafford, and since no British vessels were about, and the weather looked as if a gale was getting up, he decided to weigh anchor on the morning of March 7 and move on to nearby Santa Maria Island in Arauco Bay not far from Concepción. British whalers and smugglers were reported to frequent the waters around this island as well.